Jay Gonzalez: 'Massachusetts problems need real leadership'

Bryan McGonigle bmcgonigle@wickedlocal.com @GtownRecord

Wednesday

May 17, 2017 at 1:32 PM

The Needham Democrat sat down with Wicked Local to talk about his run for governor in 2018.

If former health insurance executive Jay Gonzalez has his way, he’ll be facing off against Gov. Charlie Baker -- also a former health insurance executive -- in November 2018’s gubernatorial general election.

Gonzalez, 45, is running for the Democratic nomination next year and sat down with staff at Wicked Local recently to discuss the issues that drive him, his hopes for the Bay State and where he feels Baker has fallen short.

"We’ve always been a leader, in Massachusetts in particular, if you think about it," Gonzalez said. "We started the Revolutionary War, were the first (state) to establish a public school, first to recognize one's right to marry whoever they love, to make universal health insurance coverage a reality, and the list goes on and on and on. It’s who we are, who we’ve always been. We’ve always been a leader, and I’m running for governor because I want us to be a leader again."

A little about Gonzalez -- he was raised in Cleveland. His mother, a longtime Cleveland resident, studied abroad in Spain in college and brought back with her a 19-year-old husband from Spain and was already pregnant with Jay.

Gonzalez’s father started out in America laying bricks for city sewers, but eventually would become a citizen and run his own small business. Gonzalez’s mother, who dropped out of college to raise him, would eventually go back to college to become a teacher.

"They put three sons through college and literally lived the American dream," the Needham resident reflected.

Gonzalez attended college in Dartmouth, N.H., and then Georgetown Law School in Washington, D.C., before returning to Cleveland, working for a law firm there. He later decided to move to Boston, where he worked for the law firm of Palmer & Dodge, which specialized in counseling cities and towns on public finance of projects.

"And then I saw this guy who was running for governor named Deval Patrick, and I really liked what I was reading about him and decided to help out on his campaign," Gonzalez said.

Patrick won, and in 2007, Gonzalez joined his administration. He then served as secretary of administration and finance from 2009 to 2013, during the aftermath of -- and recovery from -- the Great Recession. This is another similarity with Baker, who served in that role under Gov. Bill Weld and Gov. Paul Cellucci in the 1990s.

Gonzalez left state government in 2013 to become president and CEO of CelticCare and New Hampshire Healthy Families.

Gonzalez said his personal story and accomplishments show he is the right fit to lead the commonwealth at a time when the American dream seems lost and distrust in government is seemingly at an all-time high.

"I think of government as our instrument, not our enemy," Gonzalez said. "I think of it as a common tool we have to empower each other and support each other and protect each other. And I think it is incumbent upon our government and the governor to constantly be working to move us forward and address the big challenges we face.

What are those challenges? Here’s a roundup of issues Gonzalez says he would focus on if he takes the corner office on Beacon Hill in January 2019.

Single-payer on the table

The U.S. House of Representatives recently passed the American Health Care Act, nicknamed "Trumpcare," to replace the Affordable Care Act (nicknamed "Obamacare") on a strictly partisan vote with all Democratic -- and some Republican -- House members opposing it.

So it should come as no surprise that a progressive Democrat like Gonzalez opposes Trumpcare.

But how would a Governor Gonzalez address it? Massachusetts has had a universal health coverage system for more than a decade, signed into law by then-Gov. Mitt Romney, but the ACA works in partnership with states when it comes to Medicaid funding.

"This is a threat to a lot of resources we depend on to provide coverage for people in Massachusetts, and it’s very concerning," Gonzalez said.

Baker recently warned that Trumpcare could cost the state more than $1 billion, and Gonzalez also called Baker’s warnings "half-hearted."

"I think we should be, and could be, much more vocal about our opposition and working much harder," Gonzalez said, adding that one saving grace is having the all-Democratic congressional delegation from Massachusetts very vocal in opposition to President Donald Trump. "I think the governor should be much more forceful as well."

Massachusetts’ health care system, even if efforts to kill Trumpcare succeed, still needs to be fixed, Gonzalez added.

"Our health care system is broken. It is not serving people well. It is way too complicated to navigate. It is too expensive for families and businesses and government. It is crushing state government, and the quality, honestly, isn’t that great," he said. "We keep putting Band-Aids on big, gaping wounds in our health care system, and it is not sustainable and it is not working for people."

And Gonzalez said he would be open to looking at a single-payer health care system, among other options for a new system in Massachusetts.

"We gotta be focused on the ends -- which are simpler, cheaper and better -- and single-payer is a means, but I think it’s a potential means for getting to those ends, so we need to seriously consider it," Gonzalez said. "This isn’t easy. I know from my time in health care how complicated the system is, how many vested interests there are in it, and it won’t be easy. But this is another example of an area where we’re not even trying."

Get ’em while they’re young

Massachusetts frequently comes in at the top of most national surveys of state education systems, but Gonzalez said those accolades ignore a fundamental problem.

"While we are No. 1 by certain measures relative to other states, we’re also No. 1, I believe, in terms of the achievement gap that we have between higher-income, more advantaged kids in our state versus lower-income, minority, black and Latino kids," Gonzalez said. "We need to close that gap, and I think that’s the biggest challenge in education."

The most-important thing the state can do, Gonzalez continued, is get to the problem when people are young and invest in preschool and child care.

"The research is clear that the younger that person, the bigger the impact, because that is when brain development is happening. Something like 90 percent of brain development happens by age 5," Gonzalez said. "So this is the most formative period in a person’s life and it’s the time where we’re doing the least, particularly for lower-income kids who don’t have access to expensive child care and preschool."

So Gonzalez would like to see Massachusetts develop a universal child care system, citing studies that show children with adequate early child care and preschool are more likely to graduate high school and go on to college.

"And equally as important, it allows parents -- who might not otherwise be able to -- to go to work. And many of them need to go to work to provide additional resources for their family and a stable environment for the family, which also impacts ability to learn," he said.

Gonzalez then told the story of his wife, Cyndi Roy Gonzalez, who recently served as Massachusetts Attorney General Maura Healey’s communications director. Cyndi was raised in Chicopee by a young single mother who didn’t have money to spend. But Cyndi qualified for the federal Head Start program so she was able to go to a Head Start daycare and her mother was able to work, which her husband says contributed to her lifelong success.

"In my first term, every single child in this state, from birth to kindergarten, will have access to affordable, quality child care and preschool," Gonzalez promised.

That would, of course, be expensive. Gonzalez said he supports the Fair Share Tax ballot question expected to be on the 2018 ballot, which would implement a new income tax on millionaires in the state, and that revenues from the tax could fund a universal child care and preschool program.

Diversity and a sanctuary state

"I’m convinced that fear about different people, differences among people, are usually a function of a lack of exposure to different people," Gonzalez said when asked about some people’s apprehension regarding immigrants and refugees from the Middle East.

Baker has a mixed record with Syrian refugees. In 2015, he opposed having refugees from Syria relocated to Massachusetts. But in January 2017, he spoke out against Trump’s proposed refugee ban.

For Gonzalez, the issue of immigration is a clear-cut one and a personal one. His mother traveled abroad and met his father in Spain, and the couple married and returned to the United States together.

Gonzalez’s father was 19 years old at that time and barely knew any English, and he worked hard and provided a life of opportunity to his family, Gonzalez said.

"When it comes to immigration in particular, this is who we are and one of the things that makes us so different from any other country on Earth," Gonzalez said. "We literally are a nation of immigrants. Some go back a few generations, but there are many who are first-generation today."

In fact, as residents across the nation debate whether or not to have sanctuary cities -- cities in which law enforcement are instructed not to assist federal immigration officials on undocumented immigrant crackdowns -- Gonzalez wants to see Massachusetts become a "sanctuary state."

"The very first piece of legislation I supported as a candidate is called the Safe Communities Act, which would effectively make the state a sanctuary state," Gonzalez noted. "It effectively says that state and local law enforcement resources may only be used to enforce state and local laws and should be focused on keeping our communities safe and not doing the work of federal immigration officials to enforce federal immigration laws to do Donald Trump’s bidding."